


Losing Sight

by BlackandGrey



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Drarry, Love, M/M, Male Homosexuality, Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-18
Updated: 2017-05-18
Packaged: 2018-11-02 07:43:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10940058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlackandGrey/pseuds/BlackandGrey
Summary: 8th year fic in which Harry realises just how wrong snap judgments can be, Draco comes to terms with how he really feels and both discover that the fine line between love and hate might be just a little too easy to cross.Warning: deep, slow paced and angsty.





	Losing Sight

**Author's Note:**

> So I'm not sure how I feel about this, comment and tell me if I should continue the story!
> 
> I have to thanks scamander-the-salamander and mercyshowsnomercy on tumblr for being absolutely instrumental in what I have so far and for title!!! Thanks guys ily.

  
  He awoke with a gasp. Finally breaching the ice-thin yet seemingly unbreakable surface of his dream like the breathless victim of a stormy sea. A violently and increasingly reoccurring stormy sea. Yes, less a dream or even nightmare and more a fierce tide of his most dreaded fears and worst memories, black tendrils of the past leeching colourlessly into his night-time vulnerability and drowning him in recollections and blood and death.

  He rose noiselessly, not only so as to prevent disturbing the hushed slumber of his respectively less restlessly sleeping roommates, but also to leave the delicate stillness of the air and the inky darkness unbroken as he moved silently out of the room. Creeping through dusty corridors, the absence of the usually demanding, congested passages did not haunt him as it did so many others, but comforted him in a lonely caress and not once did he stumble or trip on shadows- he had roamed this ethereal world far too many times.

  It took only a handful of minutes to reach the place, crumbled pillar and thorny bush indistinguishable even in the light of day yet strangely familiar beneath the sheen of moonlight and he was soon stumbling out into the frosty air. Sitting inert against a looming stone wall in the winter dusk, his eyes slid shut and he rose his face to the starless sky, letting the cold and the black bleach his troubled emotions into nothingness. He remained until his breath began to unfurl in visible, icy curls from his motionless lips. He remained until his fingers trembled, callous and blue. He remained until numbness had spread through his entire body and the frigid air had frozen tears never to fall from stony eyes. And still, he lingered, bricks of rock and boulder claiming any remaining warmth his frozen body had to offer as he at last unfolded his eyelids. He took in the moon glaring blue like a chip of polished ice and gazed into its distant solidarity. He understood the loneliness in its pale face and the somehow beautiful pain in its fading grasp on the dark sky, thick black slowly diminishing into shadowy blue.

  Yet he still did not move because his skin felt thin as glass that refused to shatter and he wanted to, no he needed to feel the hurt swirling on the inside burn his outside too in ice drops that clung to his fair skin and seared in a divine kind of agony.

  But the sun inevitably began its steep climb and the crimson rays pricked his eyelids, even if dawn was still a far-off dream, so he began to piece himself back together into the proud, untouchable boy that the world knew him as and his joints hardly cracked as he stood and returned to elegance, the brittle but entirely resilient façade back in place. He strode gracefully back through the castle to his room before anyone had the chance to appreciate his exodus. Before anyone had the chance to feel the emanating waves of wretched misery, muted to echoing murmurs. Before anyone had a chance to clutch his nightly moment of weakness. Draco Malfoy had always been anything but weak.

 

 

  Harry woke early to the earnest light of day filtering through his drapes, eyes fluttering softly open, but he didn’t move. Lying still in a curled ball of relief that he had reached morning after all, he coerced fleeting terrors of his disturbed sleep out of his mind, and tried to focus instead on the new day ahead. Moments slipped into minutes as he gradually felt the darkness uncoil from his ribcage and soon the shuffling of Ron and the others that he shared a dorm with drove him out of his own thoughts. He pulled back the curtains of his four-poster and the strained smile he wore became genuine as the prospect of another day filled with friends and Hogwarts and distractions lifted him out of his souring mood.

  “Morning, Harry” Ron smiled and Harry couldn’t help but smile back.

  All the boys made their way down to breakfast together, and if any of the others paid notice to the bags progressively frequenting Harry’s eyes, none mentioned it, which is more than could be said for Ron; discreetly smirking into Harry’s ear about the furtively quixotic glances Seamus and Dean habitually shot each other, and Harry privately smiled to himself, wondering if either had noticed it themselves.

  As Ron sat across from Harry and began piling his plate with mountainous heaps of food (“I need lots of energy for Quidditch practice Harry, quit smirking!”) Harry tiredly swept sleep-heavy eyes around the Great Hall and found that his gaze came to rest on Malfoy, pointed chin propped up on one hand and his grey eyes half-closed; slitted in what could only be exhaustion to the bare bone, and Harry pondered if perhaps he was not the only eighth year that had trouble sleeping. He wondered if Malfoy too was still haunted by the war, flashing images of smeared grey and red stealing through his unconscious. Or maybe Malfoy was just tired and Harry was overthinking things again. He half-smiled. Although Malfoy had slowly regained popularity after the battle and his father’s trial, sentencing him to Azkaban, Harry still felt acutely distrusting towards the boy- years of hostility and hatred inerasable from the crimson splattered portrait that had made up Harry’s life so far, no matter how hard he had tried to move on from them. Even Hermione was doing her best to embrace house unity and give him a second chance, although Harry knew that Ron’s deep-set reservations were equally, if not more, interminable than his own.

  Maybe the truth was that, deep down, he didn’t really want to move on, Harry mused buttering a slice of toast. Because his and Malfoy’s bitter rivalry was the only thing that seemed to remain unchanged since the very beginning. Malfoy provoked him and he provoked back, each one of them retaliating again and again until never won fights in insults and hexes and combat seemed as second nature as breathing, irrevocably unalterable even if he owed Narcissa Malfoy his life and Draco himself owed Harry his. Though he would never admit it, Harry was surreptitiously glad that this had changed nothing between him and Malfoy; Malfoy was the only person remaining unfazed and altogether contemptuous of Harry’s reputation as the “chosen one”, which had only grown in stature after Voldemort’s death and returning to Hogwarts for the newly instated eighth year. He was the only one that didn’t seem to expect anything from Harry, the only one that regarded him with resentment rather than curiosity and thinly veiled awe. Somehow Malfoy’s still burning animosity (even if it was no longer full blown detestation) and cynicism felt like a breath of fresh air.

  “Hey Harry!” He was jolted out of his reverie by Hermione sliding on to the bench next to him and observing him with thoughtful concern “You look ill, are you feeling okay?”

  “Yeah I’m fine, just tired and definitely not looking forward to history of magic this afternoon.” He responded, almost laughing at her doe-eyed concern which seemed to continue to antagonize her about all kinds of trivial matters which, compared to what they had lived through, seemed particularly inconsequential.

  “Are you sure? Bad sleeping habits have never been a good sign coming from you.” she said somewhat more quietly, doubt creeping into her steady voice.

  “Yes I’m sure.” Harry grinned, wishing it was true “Stop worrying about me, Ron’s getting jealous.”

  “Alright…”she responded sceptically, eyeing him once over before finally allowing him to brush off her concern. She beamed over at Ron, who reached a hand over the table to lace his fingers with hers and Harry quickly turned away to discuss the Chudley Cannon’s past season’s luck (or rather lack thereof) with Seamus. And this was where Harry belonged. Wedged between friends at the Gryffindor table, debating thoughts on Quidditch strategy and spells and teachers, he glanced back at Ron, who had swiftly joined in his favourite topic of conversation, loudly defying the Cannon’s disgrace, his hand still resting loosely in Hermione’s. Yes, this was where Harry belonged, even if some things did take a while to get used to. Even if no matter how much contentment and amity he consumed, he couldn’t seem to fill this dark-edged emptiness inside his belly. Even if somewhere, deep inside he felt like everything was starting to spiral out of control.

 

  Draco sighed down at his work. Potions had always been his favourite subject but recently he had been finding it increasingly difficult to concentrate; his rehearsed looping inscription, bold and perfect, waning into smudges of grey fingerprints, and there were only so many free passes he could get for his past merit, only so many sub-standard concoctions that could be attributed to “family issues”- most other students had suffered losses greater than his anyhow, but he was dubious that a single other would agree that everything had made more sense during the war.

  It would be terrible to desire for things to return to how they had been, but Draco couldn’t help longing for the time that everything had been coherent as clockwork, his own purpose defined in palpable lines of order and command, the weight of blame lifted by the Dark Lord himself, even if his dwindling authority was stained in fear and irrationality. But then it had turned out that Draco hadn’t been his father after all; morality not so easily extinguished by power and terror alone and he couldn’t stop the conscience his father had failed to beat out of him from his mind. But he had been able to control it. Decide every move acting on a false superiority and falser hate. But that was before Harry had saved him from the fire, before Draco had seen Crabbe’s body reduced to sifting ash and he couldn’t feign the hatred anymore.

  Draco sighed again, trying hopelessly to pay attention to Slughorn’s drone but Harry had stared at him this morning, and even if it had been with aversion, those bottle green irises were an image he had tried and failed countless times to drive from his mind. The battle of Hogwarts had been about more than just the end of Voldemort for Draco- the scales had finally fallen from his eyes and he had seen things as they truly were, and always had been since that day so many years ago in Madam Malkin’s when he had first glimpsed the saviour and who would become Draco’s biggest rival.

  He glanced over at Harry, who was seemingly paying even less attention to the class than Draco, shoulders slumped, lazily doodling nonsensical patterns across his parchment. Fitting, Draco thought, that he should like to draw when he had painted Draco’s whole world in shimmering ink of green and gold. Harry had needed a villain, and Draco had presented himself. He had needed a side-kick and Weasley had instinctively volunteered. He had needed someone to save and one by one each role had been assigned, sketched in bold, permanent strokes until he had drawn a whole realm for himself; each of them orbiting him while he sat back and pretended he wasn’t God.

  But perhaps Draco was more fortunate than most for at least he was no longer blind to reality while Granger and Weasley still looked at their friend with sightless admiration. But at least they had found each other (there is little solace in the shadow of greatness other than those they share it with) while he had been dyed in shades of indigo isolation; sought for his family name and then for the name he had made for himself yet set apart by the iridescent signature on his shoulder- vibrant emerald marking him, owning him, dictating who he was. But would Draco even have changed things if he could?

  He’d been staring at Harry for too long, jade now flashing from his skull in confusion and Draco glowered back before quickly returning his gaze to his own parchment. Even if he had wanted to reverse everything, it would be unmanageable. He had been irretrievably moulded to Harry’s desired shape, donned a black cape and malicious smirk all the better to fit the part of “clever villain” and now the whole world knew him this way. Proud, arrogant, immoral. But Draco had been imagined fully developed by the genius of an eleven year old- without any depth or complexity and so he had had to create his own.

  They say all Slytherins are hungry: for power, for wealth, even for wisdom, but Draco had forgotten what it felt like to be filled. The bell for the end of lesson sounded, but he remained seated, twirling his quill unthinkingly while other students rushed up around him, a motionless white feather in a passing storm. Hate is far simpler than love, he thought. But he’d always known that.

 

 

  Distracted and lost in thought, Harry was vaguely aware of Ron’s Quidditch tactics drifting through his ears and then straight back out again. At times the game became everything he lived, felt and breathed but right now it seemed entirely elusive. He hadn’t missed Draco’s smoky gaze boring bottomless holes in the side of his head earlier and now it was reeling in his mind on a constant replay, ensnaring him in a circle of questions: What was he thinking about? Why did he watch me? Who is he really? He was tired of questions- choking on them, tired of probing for meaning in emotionless eyes of swirling silver and coming back empty handed; searching for answers just carried him to harder problems and perhaps he wasn’t yet ready for the truth. _Why can't I let it go?_

  He shouldn’t be thinking this much about Malfoy, he shouldn’t be _caring_ this much- since when did the inner workings of Malfoy’s brain begin to intrigue him so? Harry had always seen the world as separated into two; clear cut stripes of black and white without hazy lines or shades of grey. Good and bad, light and dark and Harry had always known where everything had fitted- him on one side and Malfoy on the other: opposites, rivals, perfect enemies and nothing more or less. So why now was Malfoy of all people making him question the very philosophy upon which he had based so much? The belief that he had applied to every decision ever made. It was as if Harry had been living in two dimensions, only now seeing the world in colour; the depth and shading all around him imperceptible until now. He could no longer tell what was right and wrong- if the distinction even existed or was just obscured in shadow.

  “Harry?” He started and looked up at his best friend’s crinkling blue eyes

  “You haven’t been listening at all have you?” Ron frowned

  “I have!” he countered defensively but Ron just smiled at him

  “It’s okay mate, you’re having a bad day I can tell.”

  It was Harry’s turn to frown. Bad day didn’t seem appropriate when it felt like everything he believed in was crumbling down around his head. Making a slow retreat back up to the common room, he could still feel Draco’s shuttered gaze meting into his own but he no longer felt like he could predict everything going on behind those narrowed eyes. He’d always thought he could read people- visualise their pasts and pains like the back of an intriguing novel but now he wasn’t so sure. Maybe- maybe Harry had been too quick to judge, scared away from intolerance by the Dursleys when that had been the first thing Draco was ever taught. What if he was more than a Malfoy, more than a villain, more than any of the labels that Harry had assigned him?

  Harry sat down in a worn leather armchair, utterly exhausted from all this thinking, all this curiosity, all this confusion. He had never coped well in new, uncontrollable situations although he’d faced enough for a life time. He drummed his fingers nervously against his thigh, trying to let the warmth and chatter of the other Gryffindors drown out his own mind and misperceptions but nonetheless the most disturbing question of all started ringing unease in his ears. He leaned back and closed his eyes- when had the boy he had always known as Malfoy inexplicably shifted to Draco? The familiar darkness trailed an icy, searching finger up his spine.

  He wished things would get simple again.

 

  Something felt different tonight. Draco could sense that something had shifted in the tenuous but oh so rigid atmosphere of the castle, in the frail, ageless web spun of magic and dreamers and him, the lone night walker. He supressed a shudder and moved on, he had never been afraid of the dark or the unfamiliar- it had always seemed to him that the worst of humanity was that which he already knew. His nocturnal wanderings had become somewhat of a ritual since returning to Hogwarts. Here he didn’t have big private room or a picturesque balcony to grieve upon, but the cold outside air tranquilised him nonetheless, at least enough to get through the endless days and nights of drifting pretence.

  But he was halted mid-thought by a dark shape wilting on the floor against the corridor wall, legs pulled up protectively towards his chest, head lodged between his knees. The naked admission of pain reminded him so much of himself that he almost speculated that he was still sleeping, but this figure was still inside, the air hot and stuffy within the hallway and Draco choked on such air. This figure was quivering and soft sounds of desperate grief escaped him and Draco had never lacked such restraint, even while bleeding out self-pity alone. Treading cautiously closer, his grey eyes widened in broad surprise.

  “Potter?”

  Harry’s head snapped up at once, distress reflecting glassy eyes immediately hardening into mossy rock as soon as they met Draco’s, but his mouth remained a straight hard line, lips pressed firmly and motionlessly together. He had spoken before he had registered who it was that sat pressed against the wall, draped in swaths of winter moonlight but now it was too late to turn back; the protection of shadows fleeing in his wake.

  Muddled emotions practically radiated off of the boy and Draco could feel his own pain already melting into submission; the chosen one taking centre stage once again, yet he didn’t have it in him to feel angry. It had been a long time since any extreme emotion other than misery had touched him, so he supressed a groan at his lack of self-control and lowered himself into an easy crouch, eyes level with Harry’s, noticing the fleeting surprise that registered in the other boy’s emerald depths.

  “What’s wrong?” Draco’s question sounded stiff, sympathy altogether a strange sound when passing from his usually smirking lips and Harry’s eyes widened in disbelief again.

  “Er… nothing” he replied despondently and Draco wondered if the murmured empathy wasn’t startling Harry as much as it was himself.

  “Doesn’t seem like nothing.”

  Harry’s eyes narrowed, finally grasping his senses and overcoming the helpless state that he had been found in (it was degrading enough to have been seen like that by anyone, let alone Draco Malfoy) but he said nothing, if only to ensure no further humiliation.

  Sighing, Draco stood back up

  “It’s pretty obvious that something’s wrong, are you going to tell me or not?” he said, feeling pent up emotion seeping into his voice in the form of mild annoyance, and Harry, who had returned his gaze to the floor, stared back up at him, his green eyes erratic.

  “I told you, I’m fine not that it’s anything to do with you anyway. In fact, it’s just my damn luck that the person I least wanted to see right now happens to turn up. What are you doing down here anyway? I should probably report you, I bet Filch will catch me out after curfew now and I’ll have to clean the stupid trophies again, which is exactly what I need at this moment in my life and-” He stopped himself, internally cursing that he’d let himself ramble on as usual, and embarrass himself yet again in front of Malfoy. He ran a lightly shuddering hand through his unruly hair which did nothing to flatten it. Leaning back against the wall, he regarded Draco’s closed expression and lightly smirking lips with divulged irritation.

  “Just go away.” He eventually murmured in a flat voice full of weary exhaustion and closed his eyes.

  Draco felt something stir inside of him, not quite new but familiar, something different from the ache he carried with him always, different from the angst that overwhelmed him while lying alone in his bed, different even from the breath of relief that he felt in the cool night air as he breathed wind and for a heartbeat felt utterly and completely alive. He slumped against the wall next to Harry and sank slowly down until he was sitting beside him. He stared straight ahead at the opposite wall, hearing Harry let out an exasperated sigh.

  “Do you not understand the meaning of ‘leave me alone’?”  
Draco turned to look at him.

  “Of course I do but leaving you alone right now will just add to the never-ending list of unforgivable things I’ve done to hurt you.”

  Harry’s eyes flashed as they swiftly narrowed to meet Draco’s steady gaze.

  “And I’d rather not do anything else to make myself even more irredeemable than I already am.”

  He knew he was saying too much, exposing more of himself than he should have, but he felt steady all of a sudden, even as he was falling through swirling emerald lakes, drowning in green tears that were not filled with loathing and lips that were not curved in spite.

  Harry stared back, searching tirelessly through liquid silver, Draco’s furrowed brow for once unsteady, his gaze for once wide-open and Harry’s stomach clenched; shadows stealing through his veins, darkness winding around his bones. He took a deep breath and for a single moment, he let it.

 “No one is irredeemable, Malfoy.”

 

  Staring down at quivering fingers, Harry released a shaky sigh as he strode briskly back up the corridor. Pale strips of starlight filtered down through the high windows and he was glad for it, whitening the fading vivacity of too much emotion and he desperately thrust the black tendrils of fear and uncontrolled hysteria back down inside.

  He had never been able to comprehend Draco's intense composure, even when everything was falling apart but he had admired it, yet today he had let cracks show through a momentarily transparent front and such loss of control from such a constant had shaken Harry more than he could describe. And so, he had blurted out the raw truth, a sooty veracity that had been scorching his insides for days. No one is irredeemable: something he hadn't even realised he believed until just now. Then, suddenly suffocating under shocked scrutiny; burning under flaming grey eyes, he had fled and now he was pursuing sanctuary somewhere, anywhere else. Since when did Draco make him feel so volatile? Since always, but this was instability of a different kind to hot-blooded anger and resentment and dislike. This was an instability stitched of fear and change and intensity; something profound buried deep beneath inexorable layers of pain and dread that Harry was not inclined to breach.

  But the way Draco had stared at him, the way he had let Harry read deep into his silver eyes made him feel like he was diving headfirst into the darkest recesses of his soul anyway. He stumbled and reached a hand out against the wall so as to stop himself from falling. He screwed his eyes tightly shut and exhaled sharply, trying and failing to force the fleeting retention of Draco's stunned, exhilarated expression out of his brain. No one is irredeemable. Was that true? Was Draco forgivable? He tried to recount everything the boy had done; bullying those weaker, calling Hermione names, killing Dumbledore. Harry's eyes shot open, that memory still hurt and yet, and yet, and yet- that lost look in his eyes standing beside his father, the absolute self-loathing bristling into anger when arbitrated for his part in the war, that wounded expression so many years ago when Harry had refused his friendship. His mind argued no but his heart sang a resounding yes and he knew, deep down, that if Draco looked at him again like he had just now, he might splinter.

  The stone wall felt cold but sturdy against Harry's stiff fingers and he clung to it, seeking stability and permanence in any way he could find it. Why did everyone have to leave him? His parents, then Sirius, Dumbledore, Lupin and now even Ron and Hermione in their own blameless way. He had always thought that he could rely on his hate: it was a driving force that made him strong, made him carry on even when everyone else left him behind. But now, with Voldemort dead, Death eaters locked away, he had lost the only thing he had left- his faith because now he was sure, Draco was a boy: not a monster, not a villain, just a boy and Harry's hatred had charred to ash and dust and he was left standing on nothing.

  He slid down to the floor, eyes swimming in molten pain. Tonight, he would die and tomorrow he would be reborn, but for now he let the ache consume him, flashes of silver whirling against his eyelids as he stripped down every slowly shattering barricade, one by one, apprehensive and fearful of what he might find. And when he woke tomorrow, he would be indestructible.


End file.
